I was really incredibly lucky. I was going to Tokyo and decided I should also go somewhere I hadn’t been while I was out. I was deciding between Taiwan and Shanghai and invited my friend Alan and we settled on Shanghai because it just seemed a little more exotic than Taiwan. I just pretty much randomly picked to go first week in October but it turned out Alan was between semesters for his school so he had that week off and it was also golden week for China and most people are off that week. That included my friend Dennis who recently moved to Shanghai and so Dennis showed us around the entire time.

If you are coming to Tokyo or if you are newly living in Tokyo here's a few tips for dealing with the trains and subway in here.

One of the biggest issues is there are about 10 different train companies in Tokyo. Off the top of my head, JR (Japan Rail), Eidan, Toei, Keio, Odakyu, Keikyu, Seibu, Tokyu, are all different train companies.

Recently I got into watching a bunch of old movies. I think probably because there haven’t really been any current movies I wanted to see. So I checked the IMDB top 250 and picked a few oldies thinking if they are still popular this many years later maybe they are worth checking out.

Since the last time I wrote about Japanese chips I've tried to take pictures of some of the ones I found more interesting. It seems like every month there are new flavors. The only bad part is if you find a flavor you crave they'll be unavailable in just a few weeks. I'll miss all this variety when I go back to the states.

I didn't really have that much time there. In fact I really only got one day in Osaka and one day in Kobe so don't take anything written here as a statement of truth about either. This is just my impressions of both.

Go to pretty much any Japanese super market or combini and you'll find Umaibou (うまい棒), pronounced "ou-my-bow" where the "ou" is like "you" without the "y" and "bow" as in "bow and arrow". Literally translated it means "delicious stick".

Hello and welcome to my dating info page. If it's not clear I've changed my look. You can check out my old pages if you are curious what you used to look like.

What do you want to know about me?

Well for starters, I'm a video game creator. I enjoy the creative aspects of my job. Games incorporate all the disciplines of movies, music, graphic design as well as all the disciplines that take those and turn them into a a game, game design, technology, artificial intelligence. You couldn't ask for a more creative field I think.

I'm also a programmer. It has it's advantages. I can build and fix a computer. If there is a technical problem I want solved I can usually solve it. I wrote the system that runs this website for instance.

Not so vital stats

Name: Gregg

Location: Tokyo

Age: 39

Height: 5'10 (178cm)

Eye Color: Brown

Blood Type: Alien

Sign: Peace

Dogs or Cats: Dogs

Drink: Sometimes

Smoke: No way!

Religion: nope

I love eating and trying new cuisines. When I get the chance I go out with my more adventurous friends and try new restaurants. I can't imagine eating the same dish or even the same cuisine every day. Even though I look white I'm positive I can use chopsticks better than you!

I'm a music lover. Before I moved to Japan I had over 900 CDs. I pretty much like stuff all over the board. For dancing I like techno but for listening everything is good. Rock, Pop, Jazz, Swing, Bossa Nova, Vocals, Oldies, Hip Hop, R&B, Lounge, Ska, you name the genre and there are probably a few songs I'm into. I also like singing but most of that occurs in the car while I'm driving and being in Tokyo I don't get to drive much. If the song matches my voice I do okay.

I love going to the movies of course. I especially like to going to opening day blockbuster movies and seeing them when you can feel the energy in the audience. I don't usually mind crowded places like Shibuya since the more people there are the more interesting things there are to see.

Taking me to a bookstore is dangerous since I will want to buy 50 books even if I'll never read them. I especially like Art books, Architecture books and Children's books. On the other hand I don't read nearly as much as I should. For novels I probably prefer SF or something with a new idea to challenge my imagination.

I like doing crafts although I don't do them often enough. Making my own art, photography, or even clothing. You might even consider this website a craft as well.

I'm not really into sports, both doing and watching. I would like to do more. I'd like to try snowboarding more and some tennis but I need a partner. I'd also like to try surfing. Swimming is always fun as I grew up swimming since I was like 3yrs old.

I'm looking for someone who is first and foremost a fun person to be with. Someone who says "yes" to most suggestions about what to do. I'm also looking for someone that can be my best friend. My best guess is that person should have some similar interests. Movies and music are not similar interests, everybody enjoys those. I'm guessing that is someone that enjoys all the things a computer allows them to do and maybe enjoys a video games once in a while. That doesn't mean you should be a "geek" but it means that if you find computers boring or you think video games are a waste of time then we are clearly not a match.

I'm also looking for someone that is into the American ideal of a relationship which is that once you become a "couple" for the most part you act as a couple. Because you are best friends you want to do not all but most things together as a couple. I only bring that up because the Japanese ideal seems to be you sleep together a few times a week but you play with your friends separately. I'm not looking for that kind of relationship.

You should also be smart, believe in yourself and preferably believe that you can do anything you set your mind to.

Other than that I’m pretty easy going.:-D

If you want to see more pictures or other info about me, try the older links below for older versions of this page.

Flickr.com has decided to ban Flickrdown. Their position is that Flickrdown can be used to download copyrighted images and is therefore bad. Of course this is ridiculous. Every browser can also be used to download copyrighted images and yet they don’t ban the browsers. Please complain and complain loudly to Flickr.com that Flickrdown should not be banned.

Recently a friend started using Flickr which is a great service. I personally like to save pictures locally and selecting them one at a time to download was too much of a hassle so I whipped up this program so I could download them more easily.